As a part of our Physical Education program, the children will be taking part in three skating sessions. This was our first day at the arena. For some children it was their first time on skates. There was such an improvement in their skills in our hour on the ice! Thanks to the parents and grandparents for driving and helping out! Looking forward to our second session next Tuesday (March 8).

It was Pink Shirt Day last Wednesday. We spent much of this past week talking about how to be a good friend. We read many books about bullying and created a list of "bully behaviours".

We agreed that it was much better to be a buddy and not a bully!

We had a "hear-to-heart" morning with the rest of the school. Each child got a half of a heart with a number on it and then they had to find someone in the school who had the other half of the heart. It was hard to find our buddy but we had fun searching! Once we found our match we had to glue our half hearts to make a whole heart and then write something about how to be a great friend. Our hearts are all on display in the hallway.

Mr. Levitt, our Math Support Teacher, came and did a money math lesson with us. The children learned about our different coins - what they look like and how much they are worth. We watched some short videos, listened to some songs, coloured pictures, held it and sorted it.

Wear Red Day:

Playing Pass the Heart:

Enjoying our party food:

Opening our Valentine cards:

The children have become authors lately - writing their own stories in their I Am An Author books. They draw pictures and then practice sounding out the words phonetically. It's a very difficult job stretching out all of the sounds, hearing them in words, and then putting them down in print. They have done very well for their early attempts at 'kidwriting'.

Partner Talk

The first part is to partner talk. During partner talk the students have a chance to discuss what they are going to draw and 'kidwrite' about. For students this collaboration is an important step to plan out their thinking so that they don't get to the table and not have any idea what they are going to write about. If they are stuck, then their partner can help them think up some ideas.

"Kidwriting"

After the children have had a chance to plan their thinking by partner talking, they head to the tables with their books. They draw their pictures and then "kidwrite" by stretching out the sounds as best as they can. We have been practicing letters and sounds together with a number of songs, big books, and smaller booklets.

The children are all at different stages and abilities when it comes to trying to write. For those students who have already made the connection between alphabet letter symbols and their sounds, writing what they hear is a little bit easier. They can often get the first letter (especially if it's a consonant) and sometimes some of the other consonants in a word. Vowels are a lot harder! For those students who still don't know most of the alphabet sounds, this is a much tougher job. They are encouraged to look around the room and copy letters or words that they know to represent their stories. Every attempt is encouraged and celebrated! With more practice with letters and sounds as well as lots of opportunities to write, they will continue to improve. It is exciting to watch their development!

Partner Reading

After "kidwriting", it is important to celebrate their attempts by sharing their work with me and also with their peers. They read back their finished stories to their partner (or to me) using their finger to track their printing. Listening to their partner is also an important skill. When done, the listener must then give a compliment to their partner. It can be about their writing, their reading, their illustrations, their story, etc. Positive comments are "bucket fillers"!

Story Criteria

It's always easier to do things when we know what the criteria and expectations are. Below is our story criteria that we use when the children draw pictures as well as when they write.